The Facts on Trump's Travel Restrictions
Posted on March 6, 2020
President Donald Trump has made a number of misleading statements about his decision on Jan. 31 to impose travel restrictions related to the novel coronavirus epidemic.
Trump has referred to the travel restrictions as a travel ban. There isnt an outright ban, as there are exceptions, including for Americans and their family members.
Trump said he was bold in imposing travel restrictions even though everybody said, its too early, its too soon and a lot of people that work on this stuff almost exclusively told him dont do it. Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar said the decision stemmed from the uniform recommendations of the career public health officials here at HHS.
Trump said Democrats loudly criticized and protested his announced travel restrictions, and that they called me a racist because I made that decision. Trump is overstating Democratic opposition. None of the partys congressional leaders and none of the Democratic candidates running for president have directly criticized that decision, though at least two Democrats have.
Trump said the travel restrictions saved a lot of lives and reduced U.S. COVID-19 cases to a very small number. But experts say there isnt enough data to make that determination. A study in the journal Science found the various travel limitations across the globe initially helped to slow the spread, but the number of cases worldwide rose anyway because the virus had already begun traveling undetected internationally.
https://www.factcheck.org/2020/03/the-facts-on-trumps-travel-restrictions/